The Lipscomb men’s and women’s Track and Field teams participated in the Birmingham-Southern Invite Saturday and continued to build on what has been an excellent indoor and outdoor season.

In wet and windy conditions, the women’s 5-K runners set the tone for the day with a bunch of great performances. Carolyn Latham (18:25.18), Caitlin Anderson (18:26.08) and Jenny Randolph (18:29.31) finished fourth, fifth and sixth in the fast heat.

Both Caitlin and Jenny ran their all-time personal records for 5000m. Jenny dropped her time 33 seconds from 19:02. In the B heat Meagan Hoar won with a time of 19:18.88, just a few seconds from her all-time PR, and Erin Pyles finished third in a time of 19:35.87.

In other action for the women Cree Nix opened her track season with a 12.98 100m, just one week after completing her basketball season. Louisa Van Batavia set a PR in the 1500m with a 5:04.77 and Kristin Ratzlaff finished second in the javelin with a toss of 103 feet 7 inches.

Ryan Chastain ran a time of 4:04.61, less than a second from his PR, to finish fourth in the men’s 1500m. Nathan Brame finished ninth in 4:08.06 in his first ever 1500m, while Jeff Hoover continued his great season with an 11th place finish with a time of 4:09.94, an 11 second all-time PR.

In the sprints, Chad Roberts won his heat of the 400m with a time of 51.45 and Jacob Nelson ran a PR in the 400m Hurdles, finishing in fourth with a time of 59.84.

“Our timing in terms of weather wasn’t great,” said head coach Bill Taylor. “It was very windy at times and it rained off and on all day. The rain isn’t really an issue, but the wind has an impact on most of the races. Still, I felt our athletes fought hard and learned a lot in this meet.

“Our progress as a program is pretty amazing. The big PR’s we are getting, some by 30-plus seconds, are building excitement and belief. We just keep getting better and better. It reminds me of my years at Northwest University when we were figuring it out, before we became an elite program. It’s fun to experience this process again…to see kids get it and to already know what we are going to be.”

The next is the Austin Peay Spring Fling in Clarksville, Tenn., on Saturday, March 21. Field events start at 10 a.m. and running events start at noon.